214Section III.M. L. March.
among shop attendants, waiters at restaurants, cafes, and hotels, clerks, and
persons employed in public services.
Finally, among workmen, miners and spinning machine operatives are
the most prolific ; more than five children being born on an average as a result
of marriages lasting for 25 years. It is to be noted that weavers, among
whom many work in their own homes, are less productive than spinners (489
per 100 families, as against 540) ; and again, in the agricultural occupa
tions, that farm domestics who generally live in the farm have 395 children
per 100 families, whereas agricultural labourers, properly so called, have
426.But the industries in which the workmen have less than four children are
numerous. The following have about 350 children per 100 families of 25
years’ standing : Makers of wooden shoes, coopers, toymakers, sadlers,
tailors, printers, metalworkers, electricians, jewellers and goldsmiths, the
various workmen employed by commercial undertakings, coachmen and
persons engaged in delivering goods. It appears that the occupations pro
vided by small industries, and, above all, skilled trades pursued in towns,
give the lowest figures. Manual labourers, day labourers, persons without
a trade generally employed in towns have 464 children per 100 families.
Among workmen in the industrial services of the State, road menders, etc.,
the productiveness is above 390 per 100 families; it sinks to 360 among
policemen and Customs House employes; and to 350 among the workmen
and lower grades in the post and telegraph service.
Finally, among domestic servants it sinks below three children born to
each family; families in which the head has been married for 25 years
having been considered throughout.
To sum up, among workmen, those employed in large industries in which
work is relatively regular and abundant, where employment is really stable,
where the domicile is either in the country or in industrial communities among
workers of the same class, productiveness is comparatively high. It is lower
where numerous artisans employed in small concerns live, in trades followed
in towns, and also in occupations which do not require the use of physical
strength. It is again lower where the persons classed as workmen border
on the employé class, and, above all, where the conditions of employment
and housing make establishments without children, or with only very few,
more to be desired.
The conclusions previously come to, taken together, lead to the observation
that workmen in general have more children than employers, though there
are occupations in which they have fewer. Secondly, for both workmen and
employers large businesses appear to favour productiveness more than small
ones. The surroundings naturally exercise a certain influence in determining
this, since large businesses are usually carried on in different localities to
small. The influence of the locality will be taken into account when certain
of the provinces are considered separately. To take, as an example, a pro-